KELLY MCEVERS, HOST:
New research seems to support what some teachers and parents have been saying for years - kindergarten has become the new first grade. That means more time spent on reading and math and less time for the arts, science and just play. Elissa Nadworny of the NPR Ed team has the story.
ELISSA NADWORNY, BYLINE: Twenty years ago, only 30 percent of kindergarten teachers said reading was important in their classroom. Today, it's a different story.
MARISA MCGEE: So what are some of the things that the monsters like to eat in this story? Yes?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: They like to eat cake.
NADWORNY: Three girls with beads and braids are in a guided reading group with kindergarten teacher Marisa McGee. They're discussing the book "What Do Monsters Eat?" at Walker Jones Elementary in Washington, D.C.
MCGEE: I noticed you answered in a complete sentence. Can you tell us something else?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: They like to eat stinky socks.
MCGEE: They like to eat stinky socks. Can you show me the page where you found that?
NADWORNY: Textual evidence and complete sentences in kindergarten. McGee says it's not what she expected when she changed classrooms.
MCGEE: When I came into kindergarten down from first grade, I was like, yes, what can I order for dramatic play? And I was told, oh, kindergartners don't do dramatic play anymore.
NADWORNY: A new study finds lots of classrooms making the shift away from play. Researchers at the University of Virginia compared surveys for more than 2,500 kindergarten and first grade teachers given in 1998 and 2010. Study author Daphna Bassok says teachers reported working on skills that were much more advanced than what they were doing in 1998 with a big focus on literacy and math. At the same time, she says...
DAPHNA BASSOK: We saw drops in the time they were spending on any art activities, music activities, kind of applied experiences and also science activities like dinosaurs or outer space or things like that.
NADWORNY: Another big change since 1998 - many more teachers in 2010 expected students to know the alphabet and how to count to 10 before stepping into a kindergarten classroom. The vast majority also expected students to read by the end of the year. Bassok says there are some good reasons for this. Many more students in 2010 came to kindergarten from preschool. Also in 1998, the federal No Child Left Behind law hadn't yet passed. Bassok says teachers in 2010 felt pressure from the law's emphasis on testing. So are these shifts inherently bad?
SONJA SANTELISES: Let's not over-romanticize what was going on in urban classrooms previous to these discussions.
NADWORNY: That's Sonja Santelises, VP for K-12 policy and practice at The Education Trust.
SANTELISES: People are going to interpret learning to read in kindergarten as the evil when that's not really the issue.
NADWORNY: The issue, she says, is how to shrink the achievement gap and that it doesn't have to come at the expense of fun.
SANTELISES: Rigor does not have to mean, you know, kids are beat down and are like worker bees.
NADWORNY: Now, she says, the challenge is getting teachers the tools they need to make instruction both rigorous and fun, a balance teachers like McGee are trying to strike, sneaking in a little play with a little reading and math.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: (Singing) You check, check, check your work before you turned it in, happily, happily, happily, happily in the finished bin.
NADWORNY: Elissa Nadworny, NPR News, Washington.
MCGEE: One, two three.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: (Singing) Clap, clap, clap...